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New CO2 standards for cars, vans and, for the first time in Europe, trucks were announced last month by the European Commission in its long awaited Strategy for Low-Emission Mobility. The EU’s ambition is for greenhouse gas emissions from transport in Europe to be at least 60% lower in 2050 than in 1990. However, the legislative plan contained little on reducing emissions from the aviation and shipping sectors.

Last year I learned that the so-called 2030 ‘Effort Sharing Decision’ (ESD) for which the Commission will be making a proposal before Summer 2016, can be extremely important for reducing emissions in the transport sector.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) has warned that countries will need to be more ambitious if they want a meaningful agreement on fighting global warming at this year’s crucial climate change conference in Paris. The IEA has also issued a strong social commentary: that most fossil fuel subsidies intended to help the poorest members of society do not reach these people.

As many of you know, T&E will mark its 25th anniversary with a celebratory exhibition and debate at Brussels’ Royal Museums of Art & History on 26 March and you are all invited. But now I have the daunting task of writing an editorial worthy of the occasion. How do you summarise 25 years in 700 words? Here we go.

Global headlines are being dominated by events in Crimea, and how the West is dealing or ought to deal with it. All this geopolitics seems of terribly remote interest for the issues that concern us, humble environmentalists. But is it?

As the delay on the proposal to implement the Fuel Quality Directive reaches 1,186 days, there is growing evidence that tar sands mining and drilling operations, pipelines, and refineries are exposing local communities to serious health risks and problems.

EU heads of government have postponed a decision on cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. The EU climate change commissioner put a positive spin on the delay, but disappointed environmental groups were scathing in their criticism.

Yes, this editorial has an unlikely title. If you have been following us, or the issues we work on, a little bit, the overwhelming impression is that things have been scaled back (emissions-trading aviation), postponed (the Fuel Quality Directive, possibly NOx from ship engines, truck CO2 emissions) and watered down (CO2 from cars, biofuels).